Association of US Catholic Priests brands discrimination ‘sinful’ as US president calls Guatemala caravan ‘foreign invaders’

Migrants, mainly from Honduras, gathered on Nov. 14 along the Tijuana border fence in Mexico. (Photo by Joebeth Terriquez/MaxPPP)

A pastoral letter issued by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) on eliminating racism from the Church has been warmly received and merits attention, according to a Nov. 15 statement by the Association of U.S. Catholic Priests (AUSCP).

The group distributed a newsletter earlier in the month pledging its support for the bishops' letter and promising to make it widely accessible.

"It is essential that this pastoral get much more attention, affirmation, and sharing than previous documents,” said Father Bernard “Bob” Bonnot.

“This has to be made available to parishioners across the country. AUSCP will do all we can to have our members and friends promote it, preach it, and live it if we are to eliminate racism in our land,” said Bonnot, who serves as chair of the AUSCP Leadership Team.

The group numbers roughly 1,200 priest-members and over 150 associates.

“People walking with pregnant women, walking on foot, walking in slippers, walking with children towards the USA” are not invaders, said Father Tulio Ramirez, a member of the same AUSCP team.

He was referring to the caravan of asylum seekers traveling from Guatemala to the United States. Most are stranded in Mexico. U.S. President Donald Trump has vowed not to admit them, labeling them “foreign invaders.”

Father Ramirez said that, on the contrary, military and commercial invaders from North America exploited Latin America in the past, paving the way for “people to have to leave their mother land to venture into the USA and ‘the north’ in general.”

“It is therefore more than timely that our bishops' communication comes to soothe the hysteria of rejection and to undo the justifying ideologies of racism,” he added.

The pastoral described racist acts as “sinful because they violate justice.”

“When this conviction or attitude [of superiority] leads individuals or groups to exclude, ridicule, mistreat, or unjustly discriminate against persons on the basis of their race or ethnicity, it is sinful,” the missive read.

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